Numata Tengu Festival (沼田まつり)

"Fourteen zelkova-wood floats bearing four-metre Edo-period dolls parade through Sawara's lantern-lit canal streets to the strains of Sawara Bayashi, one of Japan's three great festival musics, in a UNESCO-listed autumn custom with 300 years of history."

Sawara Grand Festival (Autumn)

"Twenty-seven hand-carved wooden yatai floats, designated a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage and a Japanese Important Intangible Folk Cultural Property, parade to Imamiya Shrine with taiko drumming and traditional dance before a dramatic night-time butsuke clash."

Kanuma Buttsuke Aki Matsuri (鹿沼今宮神社祭の屋台行事)

"Since 1966, over 600 tents and 50 shops line Mashiko's pottery-village streets each autumn, letting visitors buy Mashiko-yaki directly from resident kiln masters and compare glazes from persimmon-orange to deep cobalt."

Mashiko Autumn Pottery Fair (益子陶器市)

"Dating to the Kennin era (1201-1204), this lantern-rubbing procession recreates the Seven-Villages Pilgrimage in which the deity of Nogi Shrine tours seven parish communities by night, with parishioners pressing paper lanterns together to receive divine protection."

Nogi Shrine Toro-Migaki Matsuri (野木神社ほたる祭り / 提灯擦り祭り)

"At Komarusan Horinji Temple, home of Japan's largest Tengu mask, a Sarutahiko deity in full Tengu regalia leads a rare Shinto-Buddhist syncretic mikoshi procession through cedar forest, accompanied by Tochigi-designated performing arts Sanbaso and Ebisu Daikoku Mai."

Komarusan Grand Festival (高原山大祭)

"On New Year's Eve at Oiwa-san Bishamonten temple, pilgrims guided by conch-blowing Shugendo priests shout insults such as Bakayaro all the way up the mountain path to ward off the year's misfortunes, in an Edo-period ritual unique to this hillside temple."

Akutai Matsuri (悪態まつり) at Oiwa-san Bishamonten

"At the foot of Mount Sanbe, the Tane Kagura Transmission Hall keeps alive an Iwami Kagura tradition embedded in the Japan Heritage site of Sabimeyama Shrine."

Tane Kagura Denshokan Teiki Kouen (多根神楽伝承館 定期公演)

"On the tiny island of Tsuken-jima off the Okinawa coast, men perform a rare circle dance of Chinese origin in traditional summer dress to hand-held drums, a centuries-old communal rite confined almost entirely to this one small island community."

Too Udui Dance

"On a remote island of 1,600 people, over 60 distinct dances performed across seven hamlet stages during Obon include the beloved Kitsune Fox Dance, where children in white fox makeup charm crowds that triple the island's population."

Himeshima Bon Odori

"Youth seinenkai groups carry odaiko and paranku drums through the streets of Yomitan village on all three Obon nights, performing ancestral eisa in the living community tradition rather than on a stage."

Okinawa Obon Eisa Michi-uchi (Village Street Eisa)

"Praying for the five-grain harvest and plentiful fishing from Lake Ogawara, neighbourhood teams in Tohoku-machi's Kamikita district parade hand-made dashi floats to the cry of 'Yare, Yare' along a one-kilometre course in one of Aomori's most community-rooted autumn customs."

Tohoku-machi Aki Matsuri Kamikita (東北町秋まつり上北地区)

"Elegantly costumed dancers in deep sedge hats drift silently through lantern-lit cobblestone streets to mournful kokyu strings in one of Japan's most atmospheric rural autumn customs."

Owara Kaze no Bon (おわら風の盆)